The purpose of this study is to determine the relationship between socioeconomic status and mental health-related quality of life in a micropolitan community in Iowa and to determine the effect of neighborhood social cohesion, neighborhood violence, and unfair treatment on this relationship. I hypothesized that socioeconomic status would be correlated with mental health quality of life, such that those of low or middle socioeconomic status would have greater odds of reporting poor mental health quality of life than those of high socioeconomic status. Furthermore, I hypothesized that lower perceived neighborhood social cohesion, having reported neighborhood violence in the past six months, and having reported an experience of unfair treatment in the past six months would be associated with being of low socioeconomic status. I then explored which of these factors are the best predictors of poor mental health quality of life when considered together. The study is a secondary data analysis of health information gathered from a large, random-digit dial telephone survey of residents of Ottumwa, Iowa. To address the research questions, responses from a total of 1079 surveys were analyzed. Participants were clustered into three socioeconomic status groupings based on the following factors: annual household income, highest level of education completed, current work status, whether the respondent owned or rented their home, and whether the respondent's household fell at or below 125 percent of the Federal Poverty Level. Mental health quality of life was measured using questions from the CDC's Healthy Days Measure that specifically ask about mental health. Bivariate relationships between variables were calculated utilizing chi-square tests of independence. A series of logistic regression models were then conducted to further explore these relationships. Results showed that those belonging to the low socioeconomic status group had about four times the odds of reporting poor mental health quality of life than those in the high socioeconomic status group. The relationship did not hold true for those in the middle socioeconomic status group, as they had similar odds of reporting poor mental health quality of life than those in the high socioeconomic status group. Results also showed that neighborhood violence, low neighborhood social cohesion, and experiencing unfair treatment were also independently associated with reporting poor mental health quality of life as well as being of low socioeconomic status. Results of the logistic regression model containing the social and neighborhood factors showed that neighborhood social cohesion and perceived unfair treatment were significantly associated with greater odds of reporting poor mental health quality of life. These relationships remained after including demographic co-variates in the model. Low socioeconomic status, lower neighborhood social cohesion, and reporting experience of unfair treatment significantly predicted greater odds of reporting poor mental health quality of life. These results should be interpreted with caution, as data was cross-sectional and inferences about causality cannot be made. Further research investigating the possible causal pathway underlying this relationship is needed.

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Philosophiae Doctor - PhD / This study set out to investigate the conditions under which urban issues triggered grassroots mobilization in Metropolitan Cape Town, South Africa between 1976 and 1986. It sought to understand the form taken by such collective behavior and tried to discover the relations of power that inform urban social movements, locally, regionally and nationally. I did not only observe neighborhood social life, but neighborhood-based protests. Through a close observation of social practices in different neighborhoods I have managed to document the influence of urban social movements on the dominant relations of power in Cape Town. In this regard, I have demonstrated that through the organizational strategies and mobilizational tactics of neighborhood associations, political institutions in Black townships have been turned upside down; social relationships in some neighborhoods have been dramatically challenged and reviewed, and perhaps most significantly the legacy of constructed cultural silence amongst the oppressed and exploited has been significantly eroded from unconscious acquiescence to the status quo to a conscious disobedience to the dominant relations of power politically, economically and ideologically. It is in the mobilizational moments of resistance and organizational strategies of city-wide neighborhood networks in the form of urban social movements that there emerge, through conscious struggle, the organic potential and conjunctural possibilities for the construction and propagation of counterhegemonic social relations in the arena of conflict and contestation where the State, since 1976 is finding it increasingly difficult to elicit the consent of the governed. Thus, it is in this historically-informed context that urban social movements are first and foremost an expression of an organized attempt by the people at the grassroots level to transform the dominant Apartheid practices at all levels of society.

The formation of human capital is the main issue in this dissertation. More specifically, this dissertation discusses two alternative types of transferring human capital, in contrast to the transfer of human capital from parents to their children's education. These two types of transfer are sibling effect and neighborhood effect on children's education. Chapter 1 discusses the sibling effect on children's education, "Household Models and Formations of Human Capital with Sibling Effect in Iran." The neighborhood effect on children's education will be discussed in Chapter 2, "Intergenerational Transfer of Human Capital from Parents to Children: Does Neighborhood Matter?" Chapter 3 measures and describes the rate of return on human capital in Taiwan, "Rate of Return on Education by Using Sibling Data from Taiwan." My empirical results show the following findings. First, the presence of older sisters increases younger sisters' and brothers' education. After controlling the resource contribution factor, the empirical result suggests that a role model effect exists between daughters -- the education of older sisters benefits younger sisters in Iran. Second, assuming that the unobserved parent's preference on children's education is not correlated to the unobserved parent's preference on neighborhood, our results suggest that choosing a "good" neighborhood is important for children's education in Iran. Third, the results suggest that in 1990 data from Taiwan, upward bias in the rate of return on schooling due to the omission of family background factors is significant. / Ph. D.

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This master’s thesis is an interdisciplinary research on the ‘degaying’ process of Madrid’s gay neighborhood, Chueca, in the post-gay era and gay business owners’ entrepreneurial experiences. It strives to fill a gap in the literature in LGBT tourism studies, gender studies and entrepreneurial studies by giving voice to the LGBT community and creating contemporary knowledge and observation. The investigation involved conducting 11 qualitative semi-structured interviews with gay business owners in Chueca. The aim of this research was to shed light on the owners’ motivations in opening their businesses and to explore the challenges and changes they noticed throughout their time in the neighborhood, reviewing if Chueca has entered the post-gay era and is experiencing a degaying process. It also discusses other aspects of the district such as the marginalization of certain groups within it, its market economy and the city government’s role in gay tourism. The results of this study show that breaking the lavender ceiling is not one of the main motivations of owners in starting their businesses. Moreover, while the gay market is a profitable niche market, it is wiser for business owners to target both heterosexual and LGBT markets if possible. Lastly, Chueca has entered the post-gay era, although it is unlikely that the neighborhood will face dissolution due to its historical meaning and the fact that many people still feel more comfortable in Chueca than in other parts of the city. / <p>This thesis has been graded: VG</p>

In spoken word recognition, high-frequency words with few neighbors and less frequently occurring minimal pair neighbors (lexically easy words) are recognized more accurately than low-frequency words with many and more frequently occurring neighbors (lexically hard words). Bradlow and Pisoni (1999) found a larger easy hard word effect for non-native than native speakers of English. The present study extends this work by specifically comparing word recognition by non-native listeners with either earlier or later ages of immersion in an English-speaking environment to that of native English speakers. Listeners heard six lists of 24 words, each composed of 12 lexically easy and 12 lexically hard words in an open-set word identification task. Word lists were presented in quiet and in moderate noise. A substantially larger easy-hard word effect was obtained only for the later learners, but a measure of oral vocabulary size was significantly correlated with performance for the non-native listener groups only. Thus, the increased easy-hard word effect for non-native listeners appears to be explained as an effect of phonetic proficiency and/or vocabulary size on the structure of the lexical neighborhoods.

This work is a case study focused on the practices of a comprehensive college access program that serves students in south Los Angeles that has maintained a high school graduation rate of 100% and a college matriculation rate of 98% since 1997. This study sought to utilize the voice and experience of students of color to discern the factors that are most effective in helping urban students of color and in turn, inform the future work of the college access community. The study was driven by the following research questions: a) which practices of a south Los Angeles college access program most impact a student's ability to matriculate to college? and b) How can the epistemology of urban students inform the work of college access programs? Through observations, interviews, journal exercises and document review, this study ranked the practices in order of importance according to the participants, and identified that structure and accountability are essential to the success of this college access program. In addition, the study revealed that the students of this program succeed academically because the program, provides students with structure, access and guidance; because it immerses its students in a college-going culture; because it offers access to academic and cultural resources; because it sets high academic expectations; because it engages the family of origin and creates a family within the program; and because it enhances the self-concept of its students: college access programs see students as scholars. Using funds of knowledge as a framework, this study also introduced the original term, “masked epistemologies” which refers to the shared experiences of college access students once they enter college. The concept of masked epistemologies refers to the experience of students who enter college via a college access program, who go on to feel like her ways of knowing, shaped by the unique experience of being a high achieving student participant of a college access program from an urban setting, are disregarded in the new, unknown terrain of college, and must be masked or concealed, only to be revealed in environments considered safe. The students’ epistemologies go from being highly praised and admired, to being ignored to the point of invisibility. This study found that students of this college access program struggle with adapting to the social realm of college because they have not been exposed to class differences throughout their tenure in the program.

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